Airbus in Germany

More than 17,000 people work for Airbus in Germany. The company’s four German sites in Hamburg, Bremen, Stade and Buxtehude are all located in the North of Germany and have at a rich history in aircraft design and construction.

Hamburg

A320 Family Final Assembly Line in Hamburg, Germany

Hamburg the headquarters of Airbus in Germany and the largest Airbus site in Germany employs around 12,500 people and plays a key role in the development and manufacturing of all Airbus aircraft. The company is also one of the biggest employers in the region. Over 150 apprentices start their careers each year at Airbus in Hamburg.

Hamburg is the home of the A320 Family programme management. For the A320 Family's four members, the A318, A319, A320 and A321, structural assembly and equipping of fuselage sections as well as final assembly take place here. Around half of Airbus’ annual production of A320 family aircraft are assembled, painted, and delivered to customers from all around the world in Hamburg (262 in 2015).

The plant in Hamburg-Finkenwerder is also home to Airbus' A380 major component assembly hall, which houses the structural assembly and the equipping of the forward and complete rear fuselage sections for this new-generation very large aircraft. These fully assembled and equipped fuselage sections are produced here and then shipped to the A380 Final Assembly Line in Toulouse, France on a specially-built roll-on, roll-off sea ship.

Following final assembly in Toulouse, the empty and unpainted A380s are flown to Hamburg. They are fitted with their customers’ exclusive cabin interiors and painted in one of the two high-tech A380 paint shops before final delivery. Final acceptance and delivery of A380s for customers in Europe and the Middle East take place from the “Jürgen Thomas Delivery Centre” in Hamburg.

Hamburg also plays a key role in the A330 and A350 XWB programmes. As for the A380, the forward and the rear fuselage sections are manufactured and equipped in Hamburg. In the production domain, Hamburg's many years of manufacturing experience in fuselage structural assembly and systems installation make this site a centre of competence for fuselage and cabin.

In the engineering domain, key competences in Hamburg revolve mainly around the development of fuselage structure and the design, innovation and systems of the cabin. The Finkenwerder site also houses A320 Family maintenance training facilities that receive hundreds of airline trainees every year.

Close to the commercial airport of Hamburg-Fuhlsbüttel, Airbus operates a large spares centre - which holds some 120,000 proprietary parts, as well as a 24/7 spares call centre for its customers from around the world.

Bremen

More than 2,500 people and around 160 apprentices are employed at Bremen, the second largest Airbus site in Germany. Bremen is responsible for the design and manufacturing of high-lift systems for the wings of all Airbus aircraft. The entire process chain for the high-lift elements is established here, including the project office, technology engineering, flight physics, system engineering, structural development, verification tests, structural assembly, wing equipping and delivery to the Final Assembly Lines.

The wings of the A330 and the A350 XWB aircraft are delivered to Bremen from the Airbus plant in Broughton, UK. Here, they are fully equipped with all relevant systems, and then are delivered to the A330 and the A350 XWB Final Assembly Lines in Toulouse, France.

For the A400M, Bremen develops and manufactures the integrated fuselage assembly including cargo loading system. The fully equipped fuselage is then flown to the Final Assembly Line in Seville, Spain.

Stade

The vertical tail planes for all Airbus aircraft are produced at Stade - one of the world's leading centres in carbon fibre reinforced plastic (CFRP), the weight-saving composite material which Airbus has increasingly incorporated into its aircraft. For the vertical tail planes, Airbus has used CFRP since the early 1970s. Stade employs around 1,800 people and around 90 apprentices, and also produces other CFRP components, such as flaps for single-aisle A320 family aircraft, and spoilers for the A330. The pressure bulkheads for the A330, A340 and A380 are also part of Stade's production responsibilities.

For the A350 XWB, Stade produces the upper wing shell, the largest integrated carbon fibre component ever made by Airbus, along with the A350 XWB vertical tail plane and CFRP fuselage shells. Approximately 500 people will manufacture A350 XWB components at the Stade facility when production reaches full capacity. Stade also manufactures vertical tail planes and wing skins for the A400M.

Buxtehude

The Airbus site at Buxtehude employs a workforce of some 350 people and 20 apprentices. All the electronic communications and cabin management systems needed by both crew and passengers are designed and produced at this site. These include the cabin intercommunication data system (CIDS) used to control cabin functions, and the passenger service units for passenger seating system controls.

KID-SYSTEME GmbH - an Airbus subsidiary based at Buxtehude that supplies cabin intercom and data systems technology - creates systems for in-seat power supply and cabin connectivity. The KID-SYSTEME facility concentrates on conception and production of the internationally-certified SKYpower power supply system - which is directly integrated into the passenger seat and generates the power needed to operate laptops and personal electronic devices aboard aircraft. KID-SYSTEME GmbH has also developed and integrated the A380's entire lighting system.